From Bombay TV to Hollywood Regency Bar Cabinet

Recently my neighbor, a.k.a. the furniture fairy, asked if I wanted her Bombay TV Cabinet. The funny story about this cabinet is that last year she offered it to me and we hauled it home but it sat taking up valuable space for months. When we saw they were having a garage sale last summer, we hauled it back to her driveway in hopes that she could sell it.

Assuming the cabinet sold, we forgot about it, not realizing it was sitting in her garage all this time. When she called asking if we wanted it again I knew our monthly Furniture Fixer Uppers challenge was coming up and decided this time to do something with it.

Soon after inspiration struck and I transformed that Bombay TV Unit into a lovely Hollywood Regency Bar Cabinet.

Bombay TV to Hollywood Regency Bar Cabinet

This is what the Bombay TV Cabinet looked like before the makeover...

Other than being extremely dirty because it was stored in a garage for so long, a few knicks and scratches and missing the backboard, the cabinet was in decent shape.

The low shelf is for the concealed television with storage underneath for media components.

You can see in the photo below that the doors slide into the interior of the cabinet.

Once we got it home I was instantly inspired to repurpose the cabinet into a white high gloss bar cabinet typical of Hollywood Regency style.

Before I get into the how-to if you haven't heard about the Furniture Fixer Uppers Group, we are six talented and creative bloggers who come together on the fourth Thursday of every month and breathe new life into six furniture pieces that had seen better days. You will find links to my friend's furniture makeovers at the bottom of this post.

Last time I shared a Two-Tone Gray Dining Set makeover that had been blocking the basement workshop windows and access to our power tools for three years. I was so happy to FINALLY finish those pieces.

I've included a Materials List towards the bottom of this post. It contains affiliate links for your convenience so you can see what products I used or recommend to complete this project. What that means is that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, I may receive a small portion of any sales at no additional cost to you, which supports the costs of running this site. See my full disclosure policy

So here's how the transformation went down. I saved the pretty before and after comparison shots for the end of this post so please stay with me 😁

Clean, clean again, and dismantle

The first thing I did was vacuum the interior and give it a quick wipe with a damp cloth. Next, I added a couple drops of dish soap to a 30:70 ratio of vinegar and warm water and gave the entire cabinet a good scrub.

Next, I removed the doors and door slider hardware from the interior of the cabinet. Here's a helpful tip I learned to make reinstalling the hardware much easier - ask me how I know.

Helpful Tip: Label the hinges and hardware as you remove them and if the holes on the cabinet are not marked, label those too.

Modifying the TV Shelf Unit

Because the doors on the cabinet slide into the sides, the television shelf is self-standing and secured to the base with cam lock nuts and screws. Which means we couldn't simply build a new shelf and attach it to the sides of the cabinet.

The existing shelf being far too short to use as a bar shelf we needed to raise it to the center of the cabinet. To keep things simple, we dismantled the shelf unit and used the short sides as a template for building taller sides. The new sides were made with 5/8-inch MDF pre-cut at Home Depot to 14 3/4 x 14 7/8.

Holes for the Cam lock nuts were drilled into the top and bottom of each side (using the old sides as a template) with a 1-inch Forstner bit. The Cam pin (screw) holes were drilled to the top and bottom of each side with a 1/8-inch pilot hole drill bit followed by a 5/16-inch bit.

Installing the modified shelf unit

The Cam lock nuts were inserted into the new holes on the sides and the pins (screws) inserted into the new holes on the top and bottom of each shelf. The Cam pins were lined up with the holes on the original shelf and those on the cabinet base to set in place. With a large slot-head screwdriver, all the Cam lock nuts and screws were tightened to secure the unit to the cabinet.

It sounds a lot more complicated than it was and I plan on doing a full tutorial in a separate post soon. Here is a close-up photo of the new shelf installed and painted. You can see the round plastic Cam lock hole covers in the photo below which were painted to match the cabinet interior.

Painting the cabinet

First, the entire cabinet was primed with Zinsser Bulls Eye 123 Primer, my go-to choice for priming furniture or anything for that matter.

To achieve that smooth high gloss finish typical of Hollywood Regency style furniture, both the exterior and interior were spray painted using my Homeright Finish Max Pro Paint Sprayer. Oh my does this make the job quick and easy. It took less than five minutes to apply each coat and there are three coats of each color.

This is the interior after one coat of paint. No brush strokes and excellent coverage using a paint sprayer.

Once the interior was painted we sealed it off with plastic and Delicate Surface Frog Tape. Using the delicate surface tape was important because we didn't want to risk the fresh blue paint coming off with the tape.

A sheet of hardboard was cut to fit the back of the interior of the cabinet and painted with two coats of Tiffany blue and installed with Liquid Nails glue.

After the exterior white paint dried overnight it was time to protect our hard work with a clear finish. Three coats of Minwax Polycrylic Clear Gloss protective finish was applied to the entire cabinet using the paint sprayer. I should mention that the paint and clear coat were sanded ever so lightly with 220 grit sandpaper between coats.

Adding the jewelry

When deciding to go with a Hollywood Regency style for this makeover, I pictured the cabinet with large gold dynasty style hardware and found just what I envisioned at Lee Valley Tools (not an affiliate link). I love this 6 1/2-inch Antique Brass Arts & Craft Latch.

Here they are installed...

In the photo below you can see how the sides slide into the cabinet.

A side view of the cabinet when closed.

...and when opened.

As promised here is the Materials list for the products used for this Hollywood Regency Bar Cabinet transformation.

Front of the cabinet Before and After

BEFORE

AFTER

Interior of the cabinet Before and After

BEFORE

AFTER

And the top of the cabinet with fun bar art I created using paint pens on the glass of a gold frame.

The lesson in this Bombay TV Cabinet transformation, if someone offers you a piece of furniture but you're not immediately inspired - take it. Store it somewhere out of the way and wait for inspiration to strike later.

If it has a Cam lock nut and screw assembly (think IKEA), don't be afraid to make modifications. If we could do it you definitely can (tutorial soon).

If you enjoyed this Hollywood Regency Bar Cabinet transformation, please share it with a friend and/or save it on Pinterest. If you have any questions, don't be shy and leave them in the comment section below.

Now let's take a look at how my friend's in the Furniture Fixer Uppers group transformed these furniture pieces...

Press the links below to see the after photos and makeover tutorials...

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